On politics in the Golden State

California voters say they don't ignore anything on the ballot

Being listed at the bottom of the ballot may not be an
automatic death sentence for candidates and initiatives, according to a new USC
Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll.

Eighty-eight percent of registered voters said they vote
on every race and issue on the ballot, from president to local elections.

Just 5% said they would vote only for president, and 4%
said they would pay attention only to national races.

The results are similar to a September poll, which found that 86% of registered voters planned to make decisions on every question on
the ballot.

Political strategists are routinely
concerned that low billing on the ballot makes candidates and initiatives less
likely to pass. Earlier this year, millionaire civil rights lawyer Molly Munger
sued the state because Gov. Jerry Brown’s tax measure was going to be placed above hers on Nov. 6. She lost the case.

“There may be a marginal advantage from being listed
early rather than late,” said Dan Schnur, director of the Jesse M. Unruh
Institute of Politics at USC. “But it doesn’t make a huge difference.”

The USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences/Los
Angeles Times poll surveyed 1,504 registered voters by telephone from Oct. 15
to Oct. 21. The margin of error is 2.9 percentage points.

The poll was conducted by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner
Research, a Democratic firm, and American Viewpoint, a Republican
organization.